


safe

by irnan



Category: Marvel Avengers Movies Universe, The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-07
Updated: 2012-06-07
Packaged: 2017-11-07 03:30:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,747
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/426464
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/irnan/pseuds/irnan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bruce learns to shoot, Tony is Tony, and Steve continues to number "protecting the people he (loves) cares about" among his greatest talents.</p>
            </blockquote>





	safe

**Author's Note:**

> Alternate title: "but she's _our_ witch".

  
It's half past nine on a Sunday morning and the Tower is slumbering in sunny silence when Steve raps sharply on Bruce's bedroom door.

A few minutes pass before it opens.

"It's not an emergency, is it?" Bruce says, yawning. He wasn't asleep: his breath smells like coffee and he's got a book in his hand, forefinger clamped between the pages.

"Not really," says Steve. "You up for some strenuous activity?"

"Strenuous activity that's not an emergency?"

Steve laughs. He's wearing jeans and a pair of combat boots, and in the open collar of his blue shirt Bruce can see the glint of the chain of his dog tags; his easy stance is so different from the tightly-wound soldier Bruce met on the helicarrier, months ago, that they almost don't seem the same person. "We're headed inland. There's a SHIELD facility there with a shooting range, out in the woods."

"There are indoor shooting ranges in New York," Bruce points out hopefully.

"Nice try, Banner. You know, most people wilt when they don't get enough oxygen or sunlight."

"I'm a scientist, not a house plant," Bruce says dryly. "Besides, can you imagine trying to water the Hulk - anyway, what do you want me for on a shooting range?"

Steve shouts with laughter at the comparison before he says, "Well, where else are you going to learn to shoot?"

Bruce pauses. "No," he says. "I do enough damage."

It's true. It's also disingenuous. He's got no interest in learning to use the damn things because his limited experience of guns mostly involves the Army shooting at him.

A lot.

But Steve's set his jaw, and underneath the casual clothes and the open body language is the man five of the most dangerous people on the planet have spent nearly two years taking orders from without hesitation or argument. Bruce is beginning to be reminded why.

"Look," says Steve, "the other week, in Texas. That was - well, it was close, and it involved a lot of creeping around and being stealthy, which meant the Other Guy didn't get to come out and play. And you almost got caught."

"I'm stealthy," says Bruce, feeling offended.

"Yeah," agrees Steve. "Until you're threatened. Then you're - well, the Hulk. But I need to know that you can defend yourself without him. _You_ need to know that you can do that."

"I used to take martial arts," says Bruce slowly. "Well I mean, you know I've been practicing again with Clint."

"I do," says Steve. "But Bruce: the only one of us who's got a proper chance when unarmed against an assailant with a gun is me. Me the _super soldier_. You need to be able to take a shot before someone puts a bullet in your head, because I don't want to be the guy who finds your corpse, and I _really_ don't want to be the guy who explains it to Betty."

Bruce considers this. "What about Nat?"

Steve shrugs. "Tasha's in a class all her own, that doesn't count."

This is almost certainly true. Bruce can feel his arguments wobbling; they stand, but rather unsteadily, like drunken soldiers staggering in a parade. He slumps against the doorframe and rubs a hand over his unshaven chin.

"What if it sets off the Hulk?"

Steve looks faintly amused. "Can you control him or not?"

"Not in every situation, which you perfectly well know, especially as of last week!"

Steve waits.

Bruce sighs. "OK, so there's a difference between a shooting range and a sentient feral toaster with inbuilt laser guns."

"I thought Tony said it _wasn't_ a toaster."

"Microwave, then!"

Steve folds his arms over his chest and carries on waiting.

Bruce groans. "Look, I just - even if I do get shot at, the Hulk -"

"All right," says Steve. "How about this. You're in a situation where the guy with the gun who's about to try and shoot you doesn't know about the Hulk - doesn't have any idea who you are - and _can't_ know, for whatever reason. Someone like -"

"Someone like Blonksy." Bruce puts his free hand in his pocket, rubs his other thumb over the cover of his book, and sighs. It _is_ sensible, and if there's anyone he'll be safe with while he learns, it's Steve.

"Bruce, I understand avoiding them while you were hiding out. I do. You went out of your way to avoid anything associated with aggression and anger. But you know yourself that things are different now."

Almost in spite of himself, Bruce glances round the corridor: light and large and airy, at one end the elevator and at the other the sweeping window that opens onto all New York. The whole apartment is littered with his journals, his tech, his books; there's a framed print of one of Steve's own photographs on the wall opposite him, of Times Square empty at three in the morning, filled with light. And Steve himself of course - Steve, Tony, Clint, Nat, Thor...

_If I don't do it for me, I'll do it to make sure I'm never a liability to them_ , Bruce thinks.

"OK," he says. "Lemme get breakfast. Half an hour?"

"Sure," says Steve, and claps him on the shoulder.

*********

  
They run into Thor on the way down in the elevator.

"An expedition?" he asks cheerfully.

"Going to teach Bruce to shoot," says Steve. "You wanna come? Free crash course in Midgardian weaponry, special offer, one day only."

"Hmm," says Thor. "Thank you. I think I will. Your projectile weapons are primitive but most interesting."

"Wasn't that almost an insult?" Bruce asks, grinning. "Hang on, if we're making this a mass outing, Tony should come too."

But Steve laughs at him. "The man spent twenty years manufacturing weapons for the US government, Bruce," he says. "You really think he did that without knowing how to use one? He hates 'em, but he knows what he's doing when he picks one up."

"I... never thought about that," Bruce admits.

  
*********

"Steady," says Steve. "Take your time, and brace for the kickback. Nearly broke my shoulder the first time I fired a rifle."

Bruce turns his head and gives him an incredulous look. You could drop a mountain on Steve and not break a bone in his damn body, any more than you would Thor's.

"That was Before," says Steve.

"They put you through boot camp _before_ the serum?"

"Uh, yeah."

"I think that probably counts as cruel and unusual punishment, Steve."

"Bruce," says Steve. "Take the shot, will you?"

  
*********

  
"A fine day," says Thor at dinner. " _Somewhat_ strenuous."

"He's referring to the way Steve made us spend two hours disassembling and reassembling nine-mils before he'd let us shoot," says Bruce dryly. "I think my wrists got cramp just from that."

"Hah," says Clint, and produces a gun from - well, nowhere, unless he had it taped to the underside of the table. "Show me."

Bruce puts his cutlery down, takes it off him, breaks it down carefully. First rule of using guns, according to Steve: don't do anything quickly until you're so practiced at it you could do it in your sleep.

"S'good," says Nat, watching. "Just practice till -"

"- I can do it in my sleep," says Bruce.

"Or blindfold, whichever comes first," says Tony. He's been unusually quiet this evening.

Bruce offers him the gun. Tony shrugs and takes it and breaks it down without even looking at it; his eyes are still on Bruce.

"Better," says Nat, grinning.

"Steve said you could shoot," says Thor. "Who taught you?"

Tony hesitates, just a fraction; Bruce thinks his eyes slide to Steve, almost imperceptibly. Then he shrugs again. "Howard. When I was sixteen. Only thing we did that year that didn't end in a screaming match and/or various small explosions."

He doesn't sound bitter, or angry, or upset. His voice is calmly and unnaturally neutral - almost cheerful. Natasha's fingers twitch; she shifts in her seat.

But Tony Stark is not, by nature, the kind of man to be neutral about anything, and he might sometimes call Howard his father but he never refers to him as Dad.

Steve saw that eye-slide-thing too. "Nonsense," he says. "Howard was the worst shot on the damn base."

Tony shouts with laughter. "Don't believe you."

"Then he must have been taking lessons from a better teacher than me and Bucky - it was a _disaster_ \- of course, half the time we'd barely been out half an hour before the shelling started. Hey, did I ever tell you about the time he bussed an entire butcher's shop onto base for no reason whatsoever? Howard, I mean. Fed the entire company for a week. That was the first time I ever ate steak."

"The _first time_ you _ever_ ate steak?" Clint repeats, looking horrified.

"I grew up poor in Brooklyn in the thirties, remember?" says Steve, amusement under the grim words. "And then army rations."

"Well - wait," says Bruce. "You mean, since waking up here..."

"Pretty much the first time in my life I've ever had enough food to eat on a regular basis?" says Steve matter-of-factly. "Um... yeah. Basically."

There's a brief silence, and it's sort of horrified and sort of angry - Bruce knows it'll make him angry if he thinks about it for long enough. Steve, who's never been anything but decent and kind and good-hearted, being chronically ill and poor...

He's spent most of the last ten years being in a pretty bad way himself, but compared to Steve Bruce feels like he could make a pretty good case for the notion that he at least deserved it. It was, after all, his own damn fault.

"Well," says Tony. "I think that calls for another helping. And then alcohol. And movie night, and someone needs to tell me who's nabbed my Firefly DVDs, seriously, there's only so many insults a man can take, is nothing sacred to you people, I take you _in_ , I give you a _home_ , this is how you repay me..."

There's a ripple of laughter and a round of eye-rolling; the last of the food is dished up, Clint pours the drinks, Thor puts the gun away, Bruce watches Nat catch Steve's eye and nod at him slightly and thinks admiringly, _you sneaky selfless son of a bitch_. And then, his own eye catching on the curve of Tony's back as he bends to fetch the plate of sausages out of the still-warm oven, _yes, Tony, you did, and it is_.


End file.
